1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates generally to computer systems, and specifically to a distributed resource manager.
2. Description of the Related Art
Many commercial businesses and enterprises make extensive use of personal computers (PCs) in their daily operations. Typically, each user of a PC in the enterprise has a networked PC at his/her desk or work area. As the number of networked computer systems utilized in an enterprise increases, the management of resources in the network may become increasingly complex and expensive. Some of the manageability issues involved in maintaining a large number of networked computer systems may include ease of installation and deployment, the topology and physical logistics of the network, asset management, scalability (the cost and effort involved in increasing the number of units), troubleshooting network or unit problems, support costs, software tracking and management, as well as the simple issue of physical space, be it floor space or room on the desktop, as well as security issues regarding physical assets, information protection, software control, and computer virus issues.
Many of these issues may be addressed by centralizing the locations of the PCs, such as by installing multiple PCs into a central frame or cabinet, and locating each PC's human interface (e.g., keyboard, monitor, mouse, etc.) at a respective remote location, e.g., more than 10 or 20 feet from the computing system. In one approach, each computer in the system may be a “computer on a card”, also referred to as a computer blade or “blade”. In other words, the computing system may be comprised on a circuit card that may include standard computing system components such as a CPU, memory, power supply, and network interface, as well as an extender, e.g., a USB or PCI extender, for communicating with the remote human interface.
In networked systems where a plurality of human interfaces are each coupled to any of a plurality of computers, resource management is typically handled by a system administrator. For example, the system administrator may use various monitoring and auditing tools to determine where problems or potential problems may occur, or may simply survey the users of the computers periodically to determine any performance issues that may arise.
However, these prior art approaches to resource management tend to be time consuming and prone to error. For example, users may not provide reliable information as to their needs and workstation performance levels. Additionally, system performance audits and analyses may be difficult to schedule and/or perform, depending on the demands upon the system administrator and/or the work schedules of users.
Therefore, improved systems and methods for managing resources in a system of networked computers are desired.